a hard poetry audience last night – few skinheads, some dandies, punks, mods, rockers – mostly young with a few older hipsters – a raucous bunch in a real loud bar. i got their attention with my gravely tom waits voice & “i ain’t got no white boy blues,” but it’s not my sort of venue – more of a robert ‘dick head’ ritchie place.
kathy read ‘my first armed robbery’ – she’s a brave lady … she stood her ground, fought back against the talking, the bar noise, the aggression … they did respond well to the four-letter words in it, but most the rest was over their heads, and it was too long for their attention spans, too serious for the venue. a piece like that, they have to know you first, or you have to be famous so they want to listen. still, i saw a few appreciative souls who actually listened.
i didn’t want to read. not my venue, not my people – but after kathy’s courage, I’d have been ashamed not to get up and try. she is something – one way or another, she’s going to make something of me inside…. i’ve always been able to fake the outside pretty well.
the evening did start with smiles tho – older indian lady read her worm poems (the night was called ‘welcome to worm world’ after all). 1st worm was the penis. she ended with a pussy poem. so we’re not alone here on the edge.
evening taught me two things – we can get to and from unknown venues via multiple underground lines (thnx to kathy’s research & my return memory) … and I’m going to have to gather all my short, punchy, to the point poems together for reading to folk who frequently view us as interlopers.
we’ve read to two totally new audiences who have absolutely no idea who we are, so we have no local fame or friendship or familiarity to fall back upon. it is freeing, invigorating to test yourself against the unknown. have to fine-tune the act, but we definitely have the power. both audiences took notice of us. we’ll be going back to the poetry cafe just before we leave and show them what 5 minutes of poetry can be.
ps – my thnx to robert dick head ritchie for being in his usual fine form at our spaces gallery farewell artcrimes reading july 29, 2006 – once we got him up off the floor and to the mic, he added that jaded back alley fall down drunk piss on the world flavor that’s usually missing these days in the underground scene. artcrimes went out with a bang after 21 issues in 20 years. we got 2 fine articles of praise from dan tranberg and doug utter. and i only lost $3,500 of the $4,000 publishing cost for #21. that makes $20,000 i’ve lost on artcrimes in 20 years. who says there’s not money to be made in art and poetry.